[Infowarrior] - OT RIP: The Count von Count.

[Richard Forno]

RIP, Count von Count: Sesame Street Actor Jerry Nelson Dead at 78

by John Boone Today 11:28 AM PDT

http://www.eonline.com/news/340745/rip-count-von-count-sesame-street-actor-jerry-nelson-dead-at-78

Shall we count the ways children around the world loved Jerry Nelson? 

Read this in the voice of Count von Count, please: One, he voiced the aforementioned number-loving vampire to life on Sesame Street.

Those not in their more impressionable years might have preferred the censored spoof of the Count's innocent-turned-very-inappropriate counting that went viral.

Two, he gave life to the purple-haired explorer Gobo Fraggle on Fraggle Rock. And if that's not enough, three, he popped up not only on The Muppet Show but movies and specials throughout the years. Which makes it all the sadder that Nelson passed away yesterday.

The puppeteer passed away Thursday at the age of 78 from unspecified causes, according to CBC Radio-Canada.

Nelson, who was born in Tulsa, Okla., but raised in Washington, D.C., began his career under the tutelage of puppeteer Bil Baird (famous for creating Charlemane the Lion and performing in film The Sound of Music) before joining up with Jim Henson, another Baird trainee, in the 1960s.

Nelson bowed out of the Muppets in 2004 for health reasons but stuck with his most famous character, Count von Count.

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Just because i'm near the punchbowl doesn't mean I'm also drinking from it.